


Year One

by foolamongthebees



Series: TAZ/Harry Potter: a fun and exciting Frankenstory [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, As One Does, Canon Trans Character, Exposition?, F/F, F/M, M/M, Trans Character, here we fuckkjing go I guess, honestly I'm just doing my best here, just two different stories happening at the same time, mcelroy-typical language and content, overcomplicated justification of universe parameters, trans people in the harry potter universe because fuck jkr, will add tags as I figure out what I'm doing here
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-16
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:20:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27004201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foolamongthebees/pseuds/foolamongthebees
Summary: Instead of Faerun, the Starblaster crew lands in the Harry Potter universe. They discover that magic here works very differently, and their magic sometimes has unexpected side effects. When they split the Light of Creation, they find themselves suddenly reduced to children. They end up going to Hogwarts, eventually resulting in The Entire Plot of Harry Potter stacked on top of The Entire Plot of The Adventure Zone. Both are changed drastically by the combination.
Relationships: Barry Bluejeans/Lup, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Series: TAZ/Harry Potter: a fun and exciting Frankenstory [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1970899
Comments: 25
Kudos: 41





	1. Diagon Alley

Magic was undeniably different in this plane. It was evident in the big things, like the bizarre reaction to the monumental sorcery involved in splitting the Light, which had left the entire Starblaster crew in children’s bodies; but little magics were different too. Lucretia had thought she was getting a bit more used to it, but in moments like these, passing into a bustling magical marketplace, the alienness of it struck her again. The very laws by which magic was governed here were unfamiliar, even to someone who had spent years studying sorcery, and every wonder she saw being performed was just a bit off. It was an odd feeling, to be surrounded by a power thus so familiar and so strange.

Just as bizarre was looking at her family, much younger now than she had ever known them. Before, she wouldn’t even have been able to mentally generate the fuzziest image of an eleven-year old Merle or Davenport, and yet, they stood before her. Even after a year to grow more familiar with their new forms, watching them walk through the archway as children was somewhat surreal.

As they entered Diagon Alley, Lucretia asked one more time, “Are we absolutely certain this is the best idea?”

“I mean, we are children, and we need to learn about this world. School makes sense,” Barry said reasonably.

“Of course you think that, Barold, you have about twelve doctorates,” Taako added, somewhat less reasonably.

Davenport sighed. “It’s the best idea we’ve got. We’ll be able to learn and keep an eye on things without the…tiny-children-thing…becoming an issue.”

“Speak for yourself, I’m a very tall child,” Magnus helpfully retorted.

Ignoring this, Davenport brought them to a stop in front of the huge white building which looked distinctly out of place on this street. “Okay, let’s not all enter in a weird unaccompanied child mob, how about-”

“Great!” Lup grabbed their very full bag in one hand and her brother’s arm in the other and ran into the bank. Lucretia nodded to Davenport and followed them quietly, smiling at the goblin doorman as she entered. In the lobby of the bank, she leaned against a wall to supervise the twins, who were already talking to an employee at a nearby desk. 

There was almost certainly no bank protocol for handling very intense solo children trying to change money from an alternate universe, but the twins had never been stopped by something so foolish before, and they certainly wouldn’t now. Lucretia had come to help if they needed a rational external presence, but she knew they wouldn’t.

She instead chose to direct her focus towards the architecture and clientele of the British Wizarding World’s only bank. It was always worthwhile to document the populace of a world, and this opulent institution offered a fascinating cross-section of society. By the time Lup and Taako swept towards her with bags of functional currency, she had made detailed drawings of most of the room and had started taking notes on body language. She shut her journals as the twins approached, joining them with a quiet smile and departing the building.

Outside, the rest of the crew was uncomfortably hovering on the pavement. Magnus had started to carve another duck. Davenport was trying to stop Merle from dancing. Barry had begun drifting slowly towards the bookstore as if by gravitational pull. 

Lucretia followed him, snagging Lup as she went. Davenport joined them, saying, “Better to split up, I think. Two groups. Make sure you get everything on the list for yourselves, we’ll probably end up with extra books at least. Be discreet.”

Magnus, Merle, and Taako agreed and rushed off in a different direction, though Magnus’ whispered, “Tres Horny Boys!” did not speak to their discretion, in Lucretia’s eyes.  
Upon entering the bookstore, her compatriots were immediately forgotten. This was Lucretia’s kingdom. Words were her domain. She excelled in the artful documentation of facts, perfectly arranged, and you don’t get to that point without reading quite a lot of them and enjoying it all immensely. Any bookstore was a good place to lose Lucretia, and it would be hours, almost, before someone managed to pull her out of this one, along with a stack of books amost as tall as she was (now, at least, an adult-sized stack of books would have been a feat indeed).

Once they dragged everyone out of the bookstore, they had to get equipment and ingredients, each for some new thing utterly unfamiliar to them. They almost lost Barry to academic fascination in every other store. Davenport was unable to recall him, because he was distracted looking at telescopes. Lup eventually wandered off with Taako to try on clothes, splitting off entirely from everyone else and leaving Magnus to buy their beetle eyes for them. The whole affair put one in mind of the phrase “herding cats.”  
Eventually, Davenport, Barry and Lucretia reached the final shop, a small, dusty storefront with a single wand in its display window. Davenport pushed the door open, causing a bell somewhere in the shop to ring a high, tinkling note. 

They squinted upwards into the depths of the store. It was not a room of a size one would expect to have depths, but somehow it did. Lucretia wondered, absently, if that might be attributed to some sort of magical expansion. Judging from what she’d seen so far, that sort of thing was much more common here than in most systems they had seen.

Barry leaned over to inspect a thin box that had slipped out of the towering stacks. They could just barely see its lid, which was decorated with a faded embossed wand logo.  
Just then, a pale, elderly man with luminous silver eyes appeared before them, his sudden appearance from the shadows driving Barry back a step. “Please, touch nothing you have not been directed to. The wand arts are…very subtle. These things are not to be trifled with.” He circled around until he was standing in front of their little group, staring. “Well…what do we have here…curious. I don’t typically see groups of unaccompanied children, you know.”

“We’re very responsible children,” Lucretia offered.

Davenport stepped forwards. “We’re here for wands.”

The man turned sharply and waved Davenport forwards. “Very well then! It must be one at a time. Indeed. You first.” He began taking measurements, asking questions every once in a while as he wrapped a tape measure, inexplicably, around Davenport’s knee and left ear and forearms. “Your wand must choose you, you see. It must match. Each Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance; a unicorn hair, a phoenix feather, or a dragon heartstring. Each-”

Barry looked up at that. “How do you manage to kill enough dragons for that? You have a lot of wands here and dragons are quite tough. Is one big enough to supply for a lot of wands, or do you just rely on natural death rates, or…?” 

Ollivander looked surprised to be interrupted, but before he could voice what looked like a reprimand, Lucretia broke in as well. “Also, how do you get something that’s basically meat into a wand? Wouldn’t it rot or something?” She paused, contemplating. “Unless you somehow incorporate heartstrings in the figurative sense, as in “pulling at one’s heartstrings?” Which might just make more sense…”

“If that’s possible, the implications would be fascinating!”

Davenport cleared his throat. Barry and Lucretia both looked at him, guiltily. “Let the man speak. We can research dragon heartstrings later.”

Ollivander breathed out a sigh of relief, though the irritation never left his face. “Thank you. The mechanics of wand-making are a trade secret, I’m afraid.” He turned back to Davenport. “As I was saying, no two wands are the same, just as no two phoenixes or dragons or unicorns are the same.”

Barry popped up again, unable to stop himself. “How many different subjects of each animal do you have access to? How wide is the variation in—” 

He received a look of extreme exasperation. Lucretia got the sense that the wandmaker gave this spiel often, and that children were usually both more impressed and more respectful. Ollivander whipped around and began pulling boxes off shelves. Over his shoulder, he continued, “Your wand should be perfectly attuned to you. You may be able to use another wizard’s wand, but the results should be significantly worse.” He turned around again, shoving a box at Davenport. “Here, try that. Ebony and unicorn hair, thirteen inches. Give it a wave, that’s all. Meanwhile…” He flapped a hand at Barry, sending the tape measure to fly around him by itself. “Let us keep things moving. Yes.”  
Lucretia suspected that this man did not much want to talk to them any more. With an internal smile, she realized that Magnus, Merle and the twins had not yet been to this shop, if the man had such a reaction to the more reasonable selection of the crew.

By the time Barry was apparently sufficiently measured, Davenport had tried quite a few wands. As the measuring tape moved on to Lucretia, curling gently around her wrist, he picked up the last wand Ollivander shoved at him from those stacked in his arms. “Here, walnut. Seven inches, sturdy. Unicorn hair core.” As soon as Davenport took it, silver sparks shot out, and Ollivander seemed overcome with relief. “There you go! Perfect! Now you!” He shoved a wand at Barry.

Barry took even more tries, and by the time he had gone through a veritable mountain of boxes, Ollivander had lost the irritated demeanor and began looking intrigued and dynamic. He surveyed the stacks, muttering, “Another tricky customer, eh? Let’s see…” He swooped forwards, snatching a box from the very bottom of a pile. It teetered slightly, a collapse appearing certain, but it stayed intact, through some unseen feat of magic or engineering. “Here! An odd combination. Twelve and a half inches, pliable. Yew and dragon heartstring.”

Barry took the wand. He waved it vaguely in front of him, as he had a dozen times already. Instantly, the room was brightened by a torrent of red and deep purple sparks. The old wandmaker regarded this selection with an intense sort of interest before disappearing into the stacks and emerging with another pile of boxes.

Lucretia was last. She had an idea of what to expect from watching the others, but it was, nonetheless, somewhat anticlimactic. She simply held a bunch of sticks, gaining very little insight into the process while she was at it.

When her hand closed around the right wand (“white oak and unicorn hair, eleven inches, springy”), it sent a warm feeling of power rushing up her arm. She lifted it, and a stream of blue and silver sparks poured out. Lucretia grinned.  
They paid for the wands and left, the bell tinkling behind them. At the end of it all, it was little surprise that the old man seemed relieved to see them go.

They later learned that the others had, in fact, nearly reduced the wandmaker to tears. Lup accidentally set his chair on fire. Back on the ship, she explained, “He said it was understandable, with such a volatile wand.” She gestured with her phoenix feather and black limba wood wand to demonstrate. Merle threw himself to the side, though there was nothing to dodge. It was not unreasonable, however, since Lup had elected to test her new wand by setting several things on fire already. It was no surprise, then, that her wand was chock full of fire symbolism. 

Magnus broke in, “And Taako knocked an entire pile of wands over on the guy.”

“ I had to distract everyone from the horrible thing Merle said about apple trees. It was self defense.”

Merle picked up his wand, which was, indeed, a short and rather twiggy apple wood affair. “Just because you can’t appreciate the sensual nature of-”

Taako threw the nearest object, a book, at Merle, covering his ears. “Nope, I’m not listening to this again, you’re the absolute worst, this is unbearable, I’m leaving. I’m gone. Taako’s good out here.” He left the room. Judging by the great clattering that followed, he was in the kitchen. Lup went to join him.

Magnus raised his polished red oak wand. “Watch out, or I’ll have to figure out how to cast a magic spell! Which I’ve literally never done in any universe.” He paused. “Which makes me kinda worried about magic school, if I’m honest.”

Lup leaned back in from the other room. “If you want, we’ll fake your magic for you! Just give us the word, it’ll be a heist.”

“Hey, thanks.” Magnus grinned and, apparently without any further thought, produced his most recent duck-based woodworking project and resumed carving.

Lucretia pulled out one of her new books, an analysis of the social structure of Wizarding Britain, and began to read. If they were going to be here for a while, she was looking forward to being able to start a proper book hoard. It was difficult to keep a library on a spaceship.

Later, sitting at the dinner table, Lucretia announced, “We need wizard backstories.”

Taako’s head shot up. “I’ll be a disgraced wizard chef trying to regain my TV throne.”

Davenport sighed. “Taako, you’re eleven now.”

“I’m a child prodigy, then.”

Merle raised his hand. “Ooh! I want a cool backstory! How about I turned to dance after the death of my family and found the magic within myself?”

“I learned magic from an enchanted statue!”

Lucretia sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “This…is exactly why we need to have this conversation.”

“Because nothing you just said made any sense,” Barry agreed.

“Yes.” Davenport leaned forward. “So, we’ll need to discuss what kinds of backstories do make sense in the context of this world, and what we should present ourselves as in order to most effectively learn.”

“And to be able to keep an eye on the relics, yes. Anyways, I’ve done some research and there are a couple of important things to be aware of.” Lucretia pulled out her notes. “The wizarding society in this world lives apart from non-wizards, who they call Muggles. When they say “wizard” or “witch,” they’re talking about magic-users who we might call sorcerers: people born with magical powers.” 

Magnus leaned forwards. “So basically we’re entering a secret world we know nothing about inside another world we know nothing about?”

“While pretending we’re super normal and understand everything, yeah,” Taako added.

Davenport winced. “I know it will be difficult, but we need to get closer to this world if we want to keep an eye on it, and telling the whole truth about ourselves will complicate matters and make it hard to get out. We have to blend in enough to learn.” He nodded at Lucretia to continue.

“Some wizards are born to wizard parents, within this society, and they call themselves purebloods. Others are born in the non-magical world and they’re known as Muggle-borns. They typically don’t know anything about the Wizarding World, and vice versa.”

Barry leaned back contemplatively. “So we could potentially use that to explain a lack of familiarity with something…”

“Yes. However, there are also complicated social tensions that I’m going to need more than a few hours’ reading to understand.”

“Makes sense, when one group literally calls themselves “pure,” really,” Merle observed.

“Uncomfortable racial undertones, for sure.” Taako stood to clear his dish.

Lucretia glanced at her notes. “Yeah, probably. Um…there’s also a Ministry of Magic, they have their own government—some part of it is devoted to keeping the magic stuff secret—they’ve had a couple of big wars about the secrecy, probably also with magic racism as a factor. One of them ended a decade or so ago, perpetrated by a wizard everyone is afraid to say the name of.” She looked up. “That’s really the broad strokes of what I was able to learn in a short time. I’m thinking those of us who plan to do a lot of research and/or are likely to remember the important information can say they’re from wizard families.”

Barry leaned forward. “So that’s probably you, me, and…Dav? Lup, maybe?”

Lup glanced up from where she was whispering furiously with Taako. “Hmm? No, Taako’n’me’re going with a variation on “moved around between a lot of family, learned a weird mishmash of info from both worlds.” Works for everything!”

“Some of them might have been wizards, some of them weren’t. We’ve seen it all.”

Lucretia leaned back contemplatively. “Hm. I wasn’t thinking we’d do mixed Muggle/wizard families, because then we’d have to keep track of both worlds, but if that works for you…Davenport?”

Davenport straightened. “We’ll need people who are expected not to understand the workings of this place, so we can ask questions. Maybe I can do that, with Magnus, I think.”

Magnus started washing dishes. “I’m good with that, Cap’n’port. How ‘bout Merle?”

Merle looked intensely at the ceiling. “I…will be Scottish.”

Lup cut him off. “No you will not.”

“How about we just let Merle be Some Weird Guy?”

“Hey!”

Davenport rubbed his temples. “Merle, how about you just play up the religion thing and use growing up in a Pan commune as your excuse for confusion. Everyone, please get your stories straight by the time we have to leave.”


	2. The Hogwarts Express

The morning of September 1st aboard the Starblaster was indescribably chaotic, possibly more so than the apocalypse typically was. At least when the Hunger came, no one tried to argue with Magnus about whether or not he could bring his axe. There was also no packing involved, and they usually didn’t have to get up so early.

They had elected to leave the ship fairly close to the school, hidden and placed under wards. That way, it would be accessible in case of emergency. Davenport had explained it in full, and it made a lot of sense.

Unfortunately, this plan meant that they had to take a train into London before they could get on the train back to Hogwarts, so they had to leave much earlier in the morning (or arguably still the night) than anyone was really happy with. Still, under Cap’n’port’s direction, even the most lethargic of the crew were eventually assembled. The twins insisted upon making a not unextravagant breakfast despite their hurry, Davenport kept making people change into clothing that didn’t have the IPRE logo on it and that wasn’t obviously otherworldly, and they only just managed to leave in time.

Everyone else on the train looked rather drab in comparison to their group. Lup and Taako, in particular, each sported an eclectic and brightly colored assortment of garments that would put a peacock to shame. Davenport and Lucretia were already in their school uniforms, which, it turned out, did not resemble anything worn by non-wizards. Merle somehow looked like an old man, even with an eleven-year-old face. Barry was wearing jeans and a red jacket that appeared to also be made of denim. 

Magnus was the most normally attired, but he was busy making people uncomfortable in his own way. He was focused on glaring at a man with impressive sideburns. Magnus Burnsides did not like being a child. He wasn’t as strong, he kept forgetting how long his legs were now, and his beautiful sideburns were gone. This man simply mocked him with what he could not have.

There was a decided air of relief in the train when the group of seven very odd children with large trunks disembarked. Davenport checked the time and ushered them through the crowded station in the direction where the platform number on their tickets should be. 

“Huh,” said Magnus.

Barry sighed. “Did anyone let us know beforehand that this train station doesn’t actually operate in fractional units?”

“They most certainly did not,” Lucretia said.

Magnus walked along the wall between platforms 9 and 10, mapping out the space with arm gestures. He stopped midway along. “This part of the wall is…¾ of the way from 9. Is that—is that anything?” He poked the wall tentatively with a finger. Nothing happened. 

“Is it an illusory thing?” Davenport joined him at the wall.

Taako walked over. “Might be some…conditional transmutation…shit?”

“Cover me.” Lucretia slipped in and pulled out her wand, gesturing to Magnus to shield her from view. She cast  _ Detect Magic _ and frowned at the wall. “It’s…something? Um, yeah, nothing works the same here, but there’s definitely some sort of magic…”

“Like a door, or could it be unrelated?” Barry asked.

“Probably a door? I can’t quite say.”

Magnus squinted at the wall again. “But it  _ might _ be a door?” His face lit up, and he ran straight into the wall. 

He heard Taako and Merle laughing, and then he was on the other side, surrounded by the sounds of a bustling train platform full of families and their students, preparing to depart aboard the very red train. 

Merle came barreling through the gate and crashed directly into Magnus with a quiet “Oof.” As they were picking themselves up, Taako followed suit, only narrowly avoiding joining their pile. The rest of their group wasn’t far behind, although Lup had to go back for Barry, who was too focused on trying to observe how the wall worked and kept bumping into it.

Years of practice accounting for everyone’s diversions and investigations had bought Cap’n’port very precise scheduling capacity. They were right on time, neither unusually early nor near to being late. There was a sizeable crowd milling about the platform. It was the perfect time to board the (very red) train to Hogwarts.

There were still a few empty compartments towards the end of the train, and the group claimed one. Seven people was very near (possibly exceeding) the limit of how many people could fit in the space, but as they were now very small people they made it work. 

It was quiet, for a bit. Lucretia was sketching and making notes on the scenery rushing past outside the window. Next to her, Barry and Davenport were going over what they knew with anxious intensity. Merle had somehow fallen asleep already. The twins had started carefully stacking things on his head.

Magnus watched them, absentmindedly fiddling with another bit of wood he had been working on duck-ifying. It felt like any downtime as a group in the last hundred years. It was oddly comforting, that. As if nothing had changed, as if this journey wasn’t the beginning of something profoundly different from anything else they had experienced.

Before he knew it, an hour had passed. That’s how time is sometimes.

A woman clattered to a stop outside, offering foodstuffs from her cart. Magnus shot towards it, ignoring Taako’s look. He re-entered the cart with his arms full of weird magic candy.

The twins both glared at him. “We  _ made _ food, you miscreant,” Lup remonstrated.

Magnus rooted around in his pile, dropping several things, and held up a brightly colored object. “But did you make  _ this? _ ”

They did eat the lunch the twins had made first, in the end. It was delicious, but Magnus was genuinely excited to investigate the magic candy. Unfortunately, the first thing he tried was an “every flavor bean,” and it turned out the flavor was “unilaterally horrible.”

His gagging attracted the attention of the rest of the group. While some of them looked concerned, Taako simply grabbed the bag from him, glanced it over, and popped one in his mouth. His eyebrows shot up. “Tastes like…soil?”

Lucretia stretched out a hand for the bag and inspected it. “Huh. Guess “Every Flavor” is not so hyperbolic as one might think.” She ate one. “Oh, that’s just butter.”

Barry grabbed it and squinted at the label. “What was yours, Magnus?”

Magnus had caught his breath by then. “Tasted like…fuckin’ moldy cheese or something. Here, I want to try another.”

“You’re a dumbass,” Lup observed. She took one for herself as she passed the bag to him.

They spent a pleasant while engaged in bean identification. Even Merle woke up enough to get in on it. He declared that his favorite was the one that tasted like grass, and Taako made a horrible noise at him.

Magnus had terrible bean luck, and ended up eating several that tasted of things that should not be eaten. Lucretia looked on disdainfully, and had only just been convinced to try a benign-looking one when the door slid open. A young boy stood there, looking worried and nervous. “So sorry to bother you,” he said, “but have any of you seen a toad?” 

“I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a toad,” Taako mused.

“How can you have  _ never _ seen a toad? In your life, you mean? What about on,” Barry glanced at the boy in the door, “You know, that first place?”

“I’ve seen frogs…” 

Lucretia frowned at him. “Taako, do you know the difference between a frog and a toad?”

He looked shifty, “ _ May _ be…?” 

Davenport nudged them, turning back to the stranger. “I don’t believe so, no.”

He looked downtrodden. “Alright, I’ll keep looking. He has to be somewhere.”

Magnus leapt up. He had been getting bored and restless. “I’ll help!” He bounded out of the compartment and looked expectantly at the boy, who awkwardly gestured down the hallway. Magnus rushed ahead, opening the next door along. There were two boys their physical age inside. The other boy hurried to catch up to him and stand at the threshold.

The boys stared at them. One was redheaded and freckled, the other was scrawny and had dark, messy hair. Magnus grinned. “Hail and well met, my friends! This boy has lost a toad.”

“Have you seen him?” the other asked timidly.

The boys shook their heads, and the toadless one wailed, “I’ve lost him! He keeps getting away from me!”

“He’ll turn up,” The darker boy reassured.

“Yes. Well, if you see him…” And the toadless boy turned away. Magnus shut the door behind them. The pair continued on to the end of the train with no luck. As they reached the last door, which turned out to be a bathroom, a girl exited it. She was wearing her school uniform and tucking her other clothes into her bag.

“Have you seen his toad?” Magnus asked. The boy seemed near tears now.

The girl immediately adopted a businesslike manner. “I can help you look!” She fumbled with the door behind her. “We’re at the back of the train, so we can sweep it systematically from here. Come on.” She swept off down the corridor, seeming to expect them to follow. “My name’s Hermione Granger and it’s nice to meet you. What are your names? What do you think Hogwarts will be like? I’ve read all the books three times so I know what to expect, which house do you think you’ll be in? Gryffindor and Ravenclaw seem the best to me.” She spoke very quickly, taking a breath only at the end of this, to open a door. The older students inside had not seen the toad.

The other boy seemed a bit cowed. “I’m Neville Longbottom…My father was in Gryffindor, but…”

Hermione barrelled over his words. “I’ve done some reading on Houses running in families! I’m the first witch in my family so it doesn’t exactly apply to me but I’m very excited to learn. I only hope I’m prepared…” 

“You should talk to my friend Lucretia,” Magnus said, “I’m pretty sure the mountain of books she got could bury a dragon or something. If there are dragons here…” He checked another compartment.

Neville broke in timidly. “You never told me your name, either.”

“I’m Magnus Burnsides!” He opened another door.

“You really ought to knock, you know,” Hermione reprimanded.

The next compartment was the boys from earlier, who introduced themselves as Ron Weasley and Harry Potter and still had not seen the toad. The latter name elicited a reaction from Neville and Hermione, but by this point Magnus had stopped focusing on the conversation. 

The boys seemed nice enough, but when Hermione sat and started talking about magic, it wasn’t long before Magnus got bored and moved on, a beat ahead of his companions. He was in front of his own compartment when they caught up again.

Lup threw a jelly bean at him as soon as he opened the door.

Davenport looked up. “Magnus! We were hoping you’d be back soon.”

“I see the toad search party has grown,” Lucretia observed.

“We still haven’t seen it,” Merle reported.

Hermione took a deep breath. “Hello, my name is Hermione Granger, we’re looking for Neville’s toad. Do you know Magnus? He said I should talk to Lucretia about books. I’ve been preparing for months. No one else in my family has any magic, so I’ve memorized all my course books so I won’t be behind. What do you think of the House system?”

“Seems potentially divisive,” Davenport said.

Lucretia looked up from her work. “Ravenclaw and Slytherin are the most logical in theory. Hufflepuff is admirable in intent, but as a subset of the whole school falls somewhat short. Gryffindor is not bad in practice, but it is the most absolutely batshit crazy precept for a system of schooling that I’ve heard of. Not that that’s necessarily a bad thing.” She smiled.

Hermione looked faintly shocked, either by the criticism or the language. Before she could say anything, Davenport intervened. “How about you discuss it later? Neville looks worried about his toad, and Magnus should probably change into his uniform.” 

Neville and Hermione left, and Magnus rejoined his family in the compartment. They passed the remainder of the ride in a somewhat anxious silence. At one point someone yelled in another compartment, but they seemed fine when they ran past the door, so even Magnus elected not to bother investigating. 

After a bit, a voice announced their impending arrival, and they hurried to prepare. The train slowed to a stop at a dark platform. It was crowded with students. A lantern bobbed above their heads, and a gruff, booming voice called out, “First years over here!”

Magnus would have thought the man it belonged to was some sort of Goliath or something, if it wasn’t for the fact that he had seen no evidence of any such thing existing in this plane. He had a friendly, jovial air, and he led the small group of first year students down a narrow, densely wooded path to the side of a lake. On the other side, they could see Hogwarts, a looming castle with a chaotic multitude of towers and turrets in different styles and angles. 

At the edge of the lake was a fleet of small boats, into which the man directed the children. Magnus joined the boys from the other compartment, Harry and Ron, and Neville followed him into the boat. He saw Taako, Lup and Barry in a boat with Hermione, and the rest of their crew in another. As soon as everyone had boarded, the boats pulled away from the shore, moving by their own silent propulsion. 

The castle sparkled in the distance as they glided towards it. Millions of comments flooded Magnus’s brain, but the prospect of breaking the moment’s grandiose silence seemed impossible. Astonishingly quickly, they had reached the cliff upon which the castle sat. The boats kept going, directly towards the cliff face, and suddenly they were inside, having passed through an opening into a dark tunnel. 

They pulled up at a small underground harbor. Neville seemed to have found his toad, and everyone followed the gamekeeper up another dim passageway and onto the damp lawn in the crisp nighttime air. The opening, he noticed, seemed to seal behind them, leaving the grass smooth and untouched behind the last child.

They ascended the stone steps at the front of the castle and waited in front of the huge, elaborate oak door. 


	3. The Sorting Ceremony

Lup held Taako’s hand as they followed Professor McGonagall into the Great Hall. It was a huge room, brightly lit, intricately designed, and crowded with students. The twins had always presented a united front, and if they were to be children in an unfamiliar place once more, it seemed a good habit to maintain. 

When the hat started singing, they exchanged a look of barely repressed mirth. The mind-reading part was mildly alarming, but it was only for some sort of bizarre magic personality test.

“ _ Bit unscientific,” _ she whispered to her brother. The sound was almost imperceptibly soft, drowned out entirely by the dim cacophany of hundreds of children, but she knew he heard. 

Taako smiled, but his response was cut off as the hat finished its song and McGonagall stepped up to read out from a list of names. Barry Bluejeans was unlucky enough to be the very second person called to the front. His panic was apparent, so Lup gave him a nudge and a soft smile to send him on his way. He stumbled as he walked up, and the hat fell in front of his eyes when he sat down. 

After only a few seconds, the hat shouted, “RAVENCLAW!” Barry cast about himself in panic for a moment before hurrying to the cheering blue-decorated table. He looked back at Lup once seated, his anxiety written clearly on his face. He didn’t like being separated from the group. Magnus gave him a thumbs up.

Of course it would be far too convenient for the whole crew to be concentrated in one house, so it was no surprise when Magnus was sent to Gryffindor with only a moment’s thought more than Barry’s Sorting had warranted. He looked relieved, and Lup remembered his concern about this school. Magnus was not a spellcaster.

The Starblaster crew had highly alphabet-concentrated surnames, so Davenport was called soon after. The hat took even longer for him, and Lup wondered absently how that worked. It seemed like a rather silly sytem to her, but something definitely went into the decision. He was placed in Ravenclaw, and Barry looked immensely reassured to have him there.

Lucretia’s Sorting took over a minute. Her lips were pressed tight as she sat there, and when the hat declared her a Slytherin, she looked thoughtful as she joined the table in green. Lup noted, with a twinge of discomfort, that some of the faces around that table wore rather menacing expressions. 

In what felt like very little time at all, McGonagall called for “Fromteevee, Lup,” and she found herself walking to the front of the room. She grinned at the teacher, who gave her a severe look, and she sat on the stool with the hat. She thought she heard the hat’s tiny voice in her head, but it was only there a moment before shouting, “GRYFFINDOR!” Apparently, that was all it had to say to her.

She tossed Professor McGonagall the hat and went to sit next to Magnus, absentmindedly high-fiving him and brushing off the older boy beside him as the teacher called out, “Fromteevee, Taako!” and she craned her neck to watch her brother. 

Taako’s face creased as he, as far as she could tell, argued fervently with the hat. After a moment, it shouted, “SLYTHERIN!” He took on an expression that Lup could recognize as upset before nonchalantly dropping the hat on the stool and sauntering over to Lup. The room at large seemed scandalized, but Lup grinned.

Her brother pointed at her and drawled, “Hey goofus, just wanted to let you know that being in a different house  _ will not _ stop me from stealing your nail polish. I had  _ better _ see you soon.”

She grinned and pressed her hand softly against his before shoving gently in the appropriate direction. “Right back at’cha, dingus. Now go sit with Lucretia before the hat lady has an aneurism.” 

Taako rolled his eyes and strode away. By the time he threw himself down at his table, the girl from the train had joined Lup and Magnus in Gryffindor. 

Merle was next. It was hard not to notice, every time she saw him, how bizarre he looked without a beard. He was the sort of person who was always supposed to be an old man, and an eleven-year-old version felt unbelievably wrong. He was sorted into Hufflepuff, and looked to be in danger of trying to convert teens to Pan again. 

That was the last of her friends, so Lup promptly stopped watching until the entire hall erupted in whispers and began craning to look at “Potter, Harry.” The interest of the crowd seemed to indicate something important, but he just looked like a scrawny, bespectacled kid. He joined them in Gryffindor, and seemed excited when, moments later, the red-haired Ronald Weasley followed. 

When every child was seated, the old man at the center of the faculty table stood from his ornate golden—throne, really, which was absurd. Lup did, however, appreciate his sparkly purple robes. “Welcome!” he said. “Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you.” He sat down again.

Magnus burst out laghing.

“Is he…a bit mad?” asked Harry Potter. 

Lup swung towards him, interrupting the older Weasley saying something about Dumbledore’s genius. “He’s my favorite person I’ve ever heard give a speech, is what. I’m Lup.  _ You _ know.”

Everyone introduced themselves, as Percy said something more about genius and the plates magically filled up with food. It was delicious, Lup thought, but it had nothing on Tesseralia, or on Taako. The boys across the table were eating a lot, though. Perhaps that was typical, it had been a while since she last interacted with a genuine eleven-year-old boy. 

At the table across the room, Taako seemed to be attempting a staring contest with someone at the other end, who didn’t seem to have noticed. He returned Lup’s gaze after a moment and raised an eyebrow. She gave him a meaningful look, and he rolled his eyes and pulled his untouched plate towards him. 

When she tuned back into the conversation at her own table, the ghost sitting next to Harry Potter was demonstrating how little his head was attached to his neck. Magnus was practically vibrating with excitement. “Would you say,” he blurted, “that, when you were decapitated, that if it didn’t take your head off…it only  _ Nick _ ed it?!” 

There was a long silence. The ghost looked very offended. “I certainly would not. In fact, I consider such jokes in very poor taste.”

Magnus did not look sorry in the slightest, and the ghost drifted off in a huff. Their section of the table broke out in giggles. Lup turned to look her friend in the eyes. “Magnus, bro…that was the worst pun I have ever heard.” 

He laughed. “Not for long!”

Eventually, the dinner was replaced with a multitude of desserts, some more familiar to Lup than others. She was inspecting the bizarre, brightly colored slime that didn’t exactly look like something that was meant to be consumed. She  _ had _ encountered jello before, but in that world it was alive, and she was unsure about the rules here.

The red-headed boy, whose name Lup may have forgotten already, was saying something about his brothers.

“How many do you have again, Ron?” Neville asked.

He looked slightly morose. “ _ Five. _ And a little sister. Percy and the twins are both here, the oldest two have graduated.” He paused. “What are your families like?”

“My da’s a Muggle, mum’s a witch,” Seamus Finnegan said. “She didn’t tell him ‘til after they were married. Bit of a nasty surprise for him!”

The children laughed. Lup winced internally. She had witnessed relationships like that in the past, and they typically seemed to fester and turn out poorly for everyone. 

“How about you, Neville?” asked Ron.

It sounded like Neville’s family thought the most important thing was for him to have magic, and it was better for him to die if his magic couldn’t save him. He treated it dismissively, though, so Lup only offered to kidnap him, if he would like.

Magnus took it a step further. “I could kill your great-uncle for you if you want!”

Neville looked slightly horrified and laughed uncomfortably. 

“Oh-kay…” said Ron, “How about you then, Magnus?”

Lup could see a look of subtle panic flash across his face. “Um…they’re Muggles. My parents are, I mean. And I…have…magic.” 

“Hm,” said Dean Thomas, “My family too. My mum was a bit worried, y’know, about the mysterious magical boarding school aspect of things. My sisters thought it was really neat, though.”

“What about your dad?” Ron asked.

“He’s not in the picture.” Dean looked thoughtful for a second. “Guess he could’ve been a wizard. Who knows?”

“How about you?” Seamus asked Lup.

“Me’n’Taako moved around a lot when we were little. Never knew our parents, but lived with some aunts and cousins at various points, and some foster situations. Some of ‘em were magic, so we probably had that in there somewhere, but y’know…”

“Taako?” Neville prompted.

“My twin brother. He’s in Slytherin.” She gestured across the hall.

Ron looked shocked. “Your  _ brother _ is in Slytherin?!”

This drew Harry’s attention away from where he had been staring at the staff table and rubbing his forehead. As he turned, Lup noticed the lightning-shaped scar there. “Slytherin?” he said, “that’s the house Vol—sorry—You-Know-Who was in!”

“He’s right,” Neville added, “Slytherin has a reputation for dark magic.”

Lup laughed sharply. “Taako isn’t evil or anything. He’s cunning, and ambitious, like the hat said. Morality isn’t black and white, babe, and if you’re going to be a dick about my brother I might have to set you on fire.”

“Or  _ he’ll _ turn you to stone!” Magnus added.

The others looked uncertain if this was a joke. Before they could decide, Dumbledore stood up again to give some announcements. Lup immediately decided that she wanted to go in the Forbidden Forest at her soonest opportunity. Most of her crewmates would likely be amenable. It was a plan, more or less.

This contemplation was driven out by the thunderous, discordant sound of several hundred people singing a song with no set tune. She wondered absently if this was the intended effect. It was not particularly pleasant.

When they were done, the prefects led the first years out. Lup saw Davenport talking to Merle, probably reminding him to be child-appropriate. A lost cause.

“It’s a shame,” remarked Magnus as they ascended the grand staircase, “that Merle ended up being the only one without backup in his house.”

“Fifteen dollars says he traumatizes a child by the end of the month.”

“End of the week, more like.”

The route that Percy Weasley led them on was complex, and Lup was unsure if she’d be able to find her way back in the morning. There was also, apparently, a poltergeist, but she was becoming too tired to worry about that.

Eventually they reached a portrait of a fat lady in a pink dress. “Password?” she asked, and Percy gave it. Everyone piled in, and he directed them towards the dormitories.

As the girls headed towards the indicated staircase, Hermione Granger reignited her earlier tirade of fun Hogwarts facts. “Did you know that the girls dormitories won’t let boys in?”

Lup stopped in her tracks. “What?”

Hermione brightened, delighted to have engagement with her stream of information for the first time that evening. “It’s true! Interestingly, the reverse isn’t the case! The founders thought girls were more trustworthy, I heard.” She raced up the steps.

Lup remained, staring at the ledge before her. She had been struck with a terrible, sickening fear that wouldn’t leave her.  _ You’re a real girl _ , she told herself.  _ You’ve been a girl for hundreds of years. These stairs can’t tell you otherwise. _ The stairs loomed before her, clearly determined to doubt. She knew that any failure they offered her was wrong, but that didn’t make the prospect any less terrifying. 

An arm wrapped around her shoulders. Out of the corner of her eye, Lup identified Lavender Brown. “You can do it,” she murmured.

“But what if-”

“They’ll let you up.”

“How can you be sure?”

“My mother told me that the castle provides. It’s been here so long, absorbed so much magic, that it’s a little bit sentient. Magic can change, over time. Nothing is black-and-white. Even if the stairs were meant to permit only the people that the creator of this place thought belonged, the castle has grown into something they could never imagine. It’s become something better. The castle my mother loved would never shut you out of a women’s space. You know who you are.” She released her hold on the other girl and stepped forward, holding out her hand. 

Lup took it, and, trembling, allowed Lavender to pull her forwards. The weight of dread inside her lessened with each step she climbed, until, halfway up, she began to run until she was the one pulling Lavender behind her. Laughing, they crashed through the half open door into the girls’ dorm, where Hermione and Parvati were already unpacking their trunks.

Almost dizzy with relief, Lup pulled out her things and collapsed into bed. 


	4. First Week

Taako’s first week of school would have been good, if it wasn’t for the part where he had to wake up and go to class every morning. Apparently child-wizard school really cared about attendance. He didn’t even get to find this out the hard way, because Lucretia kept making him go to class.

“Taako, this is a school. If you miss too many classes they will kick you out. It’s literally the  _ first day _ . Taako.” She was very persuasive when she wanted to be.

Their first class was possibly the most boring thing Taako had ever experienced. Professor Quirrell clearly lacked the confidence and competence to teach children, but was insisting to himself that he was very smart and capable, thus achieving maximal irritatingness as an educator. Taako began making plans to cause Quirrel’s desk drawers to be covered in jelly as soon as possible. He missed being perceived as an adult who could just leave places he didn’t want to be without it having to be a whole thing. But, if he had to be here, he _would_ take it out on others via jelly shenanigans. 

Transfiguration was more interesting. It grated, a little, being treated like a beginner in the magic field he had been perfecting for centuries, but Transfiguration in this universe was, in fact, different from the transmutation of his own. Taako could change a match into a needle. He was fucking excellent at transmutation. He could turn wood to metal easily, and then cast a 4th level spell to convert that metal into a completed needle form. He had spent years learning magic.

Here, it was the first thing eleven-year-olds learned. Transfiguration was more of a puzzle than a spell. There were no words or gestures to memorize, but there was a lot to learn about structures before you changed them. You didn’t wave your wand in a particular way to cast a spell, you simply used it to channel your magic, your will, your intent, your understanding. Taako saw why Professor McGonagall had called it “some of the most complex and dangerous magic here.” It would be easy to do something weird if you tried to transfigure someone without understanding what you were doing.

He changed his first match using the magic he knew. It worked fine, but gave him a little jolt, like a shock from static electricity. He thought it might be a side effect of applying a spell that didn’t exist in this dimension, something that they should definitely all look into together. Fascinating as it was, he wanted to try this universe’s magic, so he would need a new match.

Taako turned and snatched Merle’s match from next to him. He held it up and frowned. “Merle…is this match growing roots?”

“Yeah. It’s also got some buds, see! The little guy’s doing great.” 

Lucretia leaned towards him. “You do know that not everything needs to be a plant, right, Merle? Like, in theory, you are aware that you have the option to follow the assignment instead of making a tree. I’m only asking because I care about you, Merle.”

Merle grinned. “I’m following my passion!”

Taako dropped the match plant on the desk, where Merle quickly scooped it up. He turned to Lucretia and asked, “Can I have your match, ‘Creesh? For science?”

She shook her head sternly, but the ghost of a fond smile hovered about her face. “I’m learning, Taako. Get your own.”

At a loss, Taako cast about the room. Behind him, two Slytherin boys appeared to be arm wrestling, neglecting the matches beside them. He smiled at them. “Hey, uh, Crab? Gargoyle, was it? How is it  _ going, _ thugs? Hey do you mind if I just,” he swept up their matches, “ _ grab _ these, since you’re not using them, you know how it is…” 

Taako used the rest of the period devising an effective combination of the systems from this reality and those he was accustomed to. He rather enjoyed this kind of school. Professor McGonagall was rather impressed, also, which meant he could achieve admiration here.

The rest of his classes were not so exciting. Charms was much like the spells they already knew, and thus a simple transition. He would have thought Flitwick was a dwarf, but there didn’t seem to be any dwarves here, so he rather wondered what that was about. At least there was enough precedent for Being Very Small that no one would accuse Merle and Davenport of being aliens when they reached an age at which humans were traditionally taller.

Herbology wasn’t really Taako’s thing. It was even less Taako’s thing when Merle was in his class, sex-talking the plants even as they reminded him that there were exclusively children present. They got him to whisper very quietly, at least, but that was arguably worse in a way.

There was probably some sort of sad symbolism in a history class taught by a ghost, but Taako certainly didn’t know what. Everyone typically seemed to fall asleep in that class, though. Lucretia, Davenport, and Barry got very upset about it.

What with all this bustle, and the astronomy class they had at  _ midnight _ on a  _ Wednesday _ for  _ eleven year olds with tiny eleven year old bodies and brains, _ Taako was exhausted by the end of the week. As luck would have it, of course, that was exactly when the first report came in.

Taako and Lup were having breakfast at the Slytherin table. They had decided after the very first day that they did not, in fact, care about which table they were meant to sit at, and even though their houses were rivals, the twins were enough of a unit that both of them seemed to belong anywhere either of them was, so no one really challenged them. 

Taako glared at his pumpkin juice. He didn’t understand why this was a thing here, and he resented the fact that he actually enjoyed it.  _ Why _ would someone juice a pumpkin? It wasn’t exactly a juicy texture as a whole. It was a wild thing to decide to do, so why was it the primary drink of these wizards? The whole thing made him inordinately angry.

Lucretia glanced at him over her tea and smiled slightly. “Maybe if you found someone to explain the pumpkin juice to you, you could be satisfied instead of just getting angry at it every morning.” 

Lup sighed. “We can’t find the  _ kitchen _ , Lucretia. There is no satisfaction here.”

She laughed. “And you can’t ask someone else because…?”

Taako turned to her, affronted. “Don’t you understand the need for  _ expert information, _ my dude?” He held up his cup to demonstrate. “How can I seek out anything less than the optimal sources to understand this most  _ vital  _ mystery? This-”

As he spoke, an owl swooped down, its wing clipping Taako’s outstretched arm. He stared at it for a moment, bewildered, before he recognized the thing it held in its grasp. He handed it to Lucretia, sighing, “Your newspaper interrupted my dramatic speech. Here, take your elderly information-gatherer, you nerd.”

Lup nudged his shoulder, grinning. “Hey, don’t diss the news. Maybe there’ll be something about pumpkins in there!” He turned to shove her back, and she ducked away, overbalancing him slightly so he had to catch himself awkwardly on the bench. Lup laughed. 

Taako turned to Lucretia, intending to entreat her to assist him in his mock plight, but the look on her face brought him to a halt. She was clutching the newspaper tightly. 

He reached out towards her. “Lucretia, what’s wrong?” 

Woodenly, she handed him the newspaper. It was open to an article on the third page: twenty people had died in a magical fire. It was in another country, but it involved some British wizards, so the paper reported it as an “international incident.”

Lup snatched it from his hands. Taako and Lucretia exchanged worried looks as she read it in silence. The air had grown heavy with tension.

Lup carefully placed the newspaper on the table. Her voice was flat as she spoke. “That sounds like my gauntlet.” The bell rang. Taako recognized relief in his sister’s otherwise flat affect. She stood up quickly. “Better get to class! Bye, guys!”

Taako followed her. “We have potions together today, dumbass.” He took her hand. “It’s not your  _ fault, _ Lup.” 

She smiled, a little sadly. “I know, Taako. We did…we did the best we could. I just don’t like the feeling that innocent people have died because of something  _ I _ made.” She took a deep breath and squeezed Taako’s hand. “But we knew there would be dangers. It sucks, but a couple of little fires are definitely better than the Hunger.” 

Their Potions class took place in the dungeons, and, as they descended, Taako wondered, not for the first time, “Why the fuck does this school have dungeons?” 

Lup seemed to welcome the distraction, as he had hoped. “Maybe the castle used to be used for something else?”

“Maybe they’re for trapping children.”

“Housing for endangered magic bats.”

“Umm…anti-ventilation laws? Laws that require you to not give kids air?”

“That’s…Taako, you get that that’s nothing, right? Like, that’s so far from being a thing that it’s not even a good joke. You understand that, right, Taako?”

They were both giggling by the time they made their way into the classroom and found a seat near the back of the class. Lucretia and Magnus sat at the table in front of them, and Magnus had only just whispered a loud greeting when Professor Snape swept into the room, bringing a deafening silence with him. 

“Hello, Professor!” Magnus called cheerily. “Hail and well met!” Snape gave him a dirty look, but Magnus didn’t seem to notice. Lup snorted quietly, and Taako grinned at her. He thought he saw Professor Snape glance at them warily, but it was probably a trick of the light. It was rather dim in the dungeon, after all. It was their first class together. There was no reason for Snape to be suspicious of them already. 

Snape stalked to the front of the room and descended on the clipboard resting on the desk like a vulture. Taako had had his first Potions class the day before, and he thought he had already reached the limit of ominous animal comparisons for this man, but apparently this was not the case. It was hilarious.

Taako was hard-pressed not to burst out laughing entirely during roll call. The first name Snape called was a Gryffindor, Lavender Brown, and his voice sounded bizarrely pinched when he said it. He said Millicent Bulstrode’s name almost like a normal person, but when he got to Magnus Burnsides, it was as if the name was something very disgusting he had to hold in his mouth. Saying “Fromteevee” seemed to cause him pain, and he had to do it  _ twice. _ Taako and Lup were no longer able to make eye contact for fear of losing control.

Professor Snape rattled through the roll call, pausing only to sneer at Harry Potter. He really was a well-practiced sneerer. 

He seemed happier about delivering his next speech, though he continued to be ominous and melodramatic. Taako was starting to wonder if this man had been robbed of a life in the theater. It would explain why Draco Malfoy seemed to admire him so much. 

Snape spun about suddenly to snap, “Potter! What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?” 

Harry Potter took on a sort of muted deer-in-headlights expression, glancing about the room in bewilderment. “I don’t know, sir.”

Hermione Granger waved her hand in the air. 

Absently, but not very quietly, Taako remarked to Lup, “Isn’t wormwood in fucking  _ absinthe? _ Does this class teach us how to make hard drugs?” 

Professor Snape was not prepared to be thus interrupted. “Language… _ Fromteevee. _ Five points from Gryffindor!”

“I’m not  _ in _ Gryffindor, darling. You should get your eyes checked.” Taako pulled at his silver-and-green tie meaningully. 

Snape looked murderous and also deeply, deeply exhausted. “Five points from Slytherin, then!” He turned back to Harry Potter.

Lup grinned at Taako. “How does it feel to be mistaken for the cool twin?”

“Ha, I  _ am _ the cool twin.”

Lucretia turned around just enough to give them a Look, and the twins turned to face the front of the classroom again, where Snape was asking Harry another question. The boy looked just as confused as before. Hermione was practically levitating out of her seat now, her hand stretched towards the ceiling.

Taako leaned his head on Lup’s shoulder.He infinitely preferred the classes they shared, but in any case he was not much enjoying his youthful education. The twins’ only experience with formal schooling had been as adults, at the Institute, and it turned out college classes were much less restrictive. Children were held to much higher standards regarding things like “being polite” and “paying attention” and “not swearing” or whatever. He was bored.

Things picked up a bit, however, when they moved on to the practical part of the lesson. Potions were pretty much cooking with magic, and Taako excelled at those things. He and Lup worked as well together here as in a kitchen, their hands dancing around each other in the practiced motions of a long elven lifetime. 

Even the prowling Snape found nothing to criticize in their performance. He was wandering around the room being very snide at eleven year olds, but when he peered into the twins’ cauldron he only nodded stiffly before swinging around to loom disapprovingly over an anxious-looking student. 

Lup grinned at Taako across their cauldron. Her hair had come undone slightly in the course of her stirring, but she looked genuinely happy for the first time that day. “We really are just the best at magic, huh?”

Taako flicked a dried nettle at her. “No, I think I’m the best at magic. You’re just basking in my glow.”

Lup brushed off the dried leaf and laughed. “You wish! I remember-”

Just then, a loud hissing filled the dungeon. Neville Longbottom had managed to melt his partner’s cauldron. His potion began to spew out over the floor, but before it could spread far, Lucretia leapt to her feet, wand outstretched. A glimmering shield appeared around the cauldron, stopping the potion’s spread. Clouds of green smoke swirled inside Lucretia’s shield.

The potion was contained, but Neville had still been splashed by some of it when it first collapsed. His arms and legs seemed to be turning an angry, lumpy red, and he whimpered in pain.

“You fool!” Snape hissed, “I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire?” He surveyed the ruined cauldron, still hissing menacingly from inside its bubble, before turning to Lucretia. “Quick thinking, Miss Director. Good…work. Ten points to Slytherin. Would you…remove your spell? So I can clean up the mess…?”

Lucretia reshaped her shield so it was flatter and open on the top, and Snape vanished the spilled potion with a wave of his wand. He turned back to Neville, who was utterly covered in painful boils now. “Someone take him to the hospital wing.” Snape waved a hand at Neville. He seemed to be going for  _ venomous _ , but mostly he just sounded tired to Taako. 

Lucretia led Neville away. Taako suspected she had decided to mentally adopt this random boy, and shrugged to himself. She was like that sometimes.

This taken care of, Snape rounded on Harry Potter, sitting next to where Neville had been. He still seemed angry, but the distraction of Lucretia’s shield had taken the wind out of his sails just a bit. “You—Potter—why didn’t you tell him not to add the quills? Thought it would make you look good if he got it wrong?”

“I doubt he noticed,” Magnus offered. “I wasn’t paying attention to other people’s potions.”

“Were you even paying attention to your own potion? I wouldn’t say attention is your strong suit.” Taako nudged Magnus with a foot.

“No, my strong suit is a suit of armor!”

Lup sighed. “No. No puns.”

Snape swept back behind his desk. “Just—stop. Five points from Gryffindor.” After a pause, he looked back up at everybody as if he was shocked they were still here. “Clean up. Class is over.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have decided to characterize Snape as mostly just very tired and very sad. He is still a kind of bad person who should not be teaching children, but not an incel or anything. I think this is fun and neat.
> 
> Also this chapter would ideally have gone through some more revision but I'm feeling somewhat guilty for not updating in a month so here we are. Probably being irrational about that one. Anyway.


End file.
